Day 50 June 25th, 2011 Lachute QC to Alfred Ont. 51km – Guest Blog

Hi folks!  This is a bit of a special appearance blog by me, Michael Downie.  I am Riley's right hand man on the road.  It's hard to put a job title on what I do, as it is so broad and always changing, but the simplest way to put it is I take care of everything on the road except for the running.  I leave that up to the expert.

Anyways, on to our day.  It is amazing how the rain waits for Riley to be ready, and as soon as he puts on his runners, it then springs a leak in the clouds and pours on him.  Riley was running in the rain all morning, and I have to be honest, it was perhaps my first day in a while where I had absolutely no interest in running with him.

The rain eased just enough to allow us a few dry moments to photograph Riley as he ran across the bridge from Québec into Hawkesbury Ontario.  He just ran into his 6th province!  Incredible Riley, really incredible!

We stopped for lunch on the side of the highway in front of a farm with lots of wet horses in stables out front.  Since, we were on an angled shoulder, I dropped jacks (to level out the RV) and even extended the awning so that Riley could sit on the steps outside and not flood the MCC with water and sweat.  Lauren served us all up more of her amazing sandwiches.  Delicious as always!

As we were eating lunch, the rain had started to ease, giving Riley hope that the afternoon run may be a little better for him.  He was wrong.  The skies weren't easing up, they were reloading before unleashing everything on him just as he stepped out from the MCC again!  It really was amazing.  

During the afternoon downpour, our windshield wipers started to work much more aggressively until they were flying off the side of the windshield before they eventually self destructed and decided to stop working all together.  That's right. Stuck in a downpour, with no windshield wipers.  At least I only had to drive at 10km an hour.

Once Riley had stopped running, Lauren and I had looked up a camping site for us to stay in that night.  It was a few kms down the road, but we really needed to dump and fill with water.  When we arrived at the office, Lauren said that this time she would go in and do the talking.  She came out shortly after with a smile on her face and a complimentary spot for us to stay in for the night.  Well done, Lauren.  We followed the gentleman to our camping spot, and this must have been the biggest RV park I have ever seen!  There must have been hundreds of spots, as well as a farm, restaurant, 2 laundry facilities, a pool, trampolines, playgrounds, basketball courts AND a man-made lake!  The large lake in the middle of the grounds had a beach area, as well as 2 rope swings and 2 fountains in the middle.  Very impressive.  Sorry, I'm rambling… So after parking in our spot, the owner asked Riley if having sex reduces your chance of Prostate Cancer.  Riley, being the doctor clarified the statement and explained that it was sexual activity decreases the chance of Prostate Cancer.  The owner, with a big smile on his face, immediately pulled out his phone and made Riley tell his wife.  

It was finally time to show Lauren how to hook up the RV and dump the sewage.  She ran back into the RV, then came running back out with big blue rubber gloves (having heard the horror story that happened to me just a few days prior).  Riley and I decided to enjoy this moment and made sure to warn her about all possible outcomes of this procedure.  Now extremely nervous, she readied her stance and prepared for the worst.  Once Riley and I had dragged this on long enough, we pulled the handle and Lauren was immediately disappointed by a simple woosh and slight pull on the hose.  Oh well, Riley and I enjoyed it.

The walk to the RV Park restaurant was full of conversation that went a little like this "Wow, look at the size of that one!"  "Whoa, check out the extensions on that one!"  We have officially become RV fans!  Dinner was a fully loaded hot dog and cheeseburger each for Riley and I, along with a large shared Poutine.  Not so healthy, but they actually didn't offer anything else on the menu.  More of a snack bar than a 'restaurant'.

Riley relaxed this evening as Lauren happily massaged his calves.  

Hopefully tomorrow brings better weather.